


Hyperion City

by erinaceous



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Angst, Background scott/kandros, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Meridian, Post-Game, Ryder Family Feelz, chapter 2 turned into an accidental Sara character study type thing oops, jaal calls sara a temptress but we all know who the real tart is here, sexy massages, smut in later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2019-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-29 01:15:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13916238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erinaceous/pseuds/erinaceous
Summary: A year after Alec Ryder's death, Sara feels the loss of her father more keenly than ever. With the Initiative determined to celebrate the anniversary of the Pathfinder's arrival in Heleus in the newly-completed outpost on Meridian, Hyperion City, all she wants is to crawl into Jaal's arms and forget the world. But the universe has other ideas, as a gruesome discovery at the edge of a fledgling outpost soon thrusts the Pathfinder and her team back into action, and Sara must juggle her grief for Alec with her duty to the Initiative, and solve the mystery before it's too late.





	1. Chapter 1

 

The first thing Jaal noticed when he awoke from a deep, dreamless sleep was that his _taoshay_ was not beside him.

He rubbed his eyes, reaching for her with his bioelectrics. That was their morning ritual now—he would send a gentle brush of static over her skin, and she would respond in kind with her biotics. The warmth would seep over him and he would reach out and draw her to him, pressing sleepy kisses to her forehead, her neck, her lips, until she would mumble something about coffee and wander off in search of breakfast. Unless there was no rush that morning, in which case she would wrap her legs around his hips and draw him closer. Those were his favourite mornings.

Today, though, the bed was empty, though it still held a little of her warmth. He sat up, relieved when he saw her form silhouetted at her computer screen. She hadn't left him after all. Maybe he'd just overslept.

On silent feet well used to slinking through kett bases and past enemy guards, Jaal slipped out of bed and crept over to Sara's desk, holding back his bioelectricity so she wouldn't feel him coming. Even so, she didn't startle when he slid his arms around her and nuzzled her hair. “Good morning, my darling,” he purred in her ear.

“Hey,” she said, covering his hands with hers, but her voice wobbled.

Jaal froze and listened. There was a slight quaver to the usually-steady hum of her biotics that he'd grown so used to. He released her from his embrace, but linked her fingers through his and knelt by her side, turning her desk chair slightly to face him.

“ _Taoshay?_ Has something upset you?” He reached up and wiped a tear from her cheek. Her eyes were pink and puffy; she'd been crying a while, then. Why had she not woken him?

She sniffed, twisting the fabric of her tank top in her free hand, her eyes gazing at the computer screen but not, he thought, seeing it. “I had...I got an email,” she said. “From Tann.”

Jaal's heart ached for her, at the way her shoulders, normally so straight and confident, sagged, like she was trying to curl in on herself. “Is it your brother?” He asked gently. Then, hating to give voice to the thought, “Or your mother?” If something had happened to Sara's True Mother, supposedly kept so safe encased in ice, even he didn't know how he could possibly begin to comfort her.

She shook her head, and his fear eased slightly. “No, nothing like that.” She sighed, glancing at the email again. “The Initiative's decided to hold a...a party, I guess, like a formal thing. On Meridian, to mark a year since the arrival of the _Hyperion_.”

“And it would have been a year since your father died,” Jaal finished, finally understanding.

Sara swiped away another tear before it could fall. “Yeah. I don't know how angara mourn, but for us the first year without someone is the hardest. I wanted to spend the day with you and Scott, and mom, but...” she trailed off, waving a hand at the screen. “Tann has other ideas. He said attendance is mandatory for the human Pathfinder.”

“Could they not simply hold the party on the Nexus?”

Sara shook her head. “No room. Ugh, I _hate_ crowds. Fucking Tann, he _knew_ I'd hate this.”

“Come here,” he said, standing up and opening his arms to her. He scooped her up when she buried her face against his hood and carried her back to the bed. “It is not fair for Tann to treat you like this, after all you have done for the Initiative, but I will be here for you through all of it.” He settled down against the headrest, running his fingers through her hair and tucking it behind her ear. She always seemed to relax when he did that, and even as he spoke he felt her breathing even out.

For a while, they sat in comfortable silence, Jaal tracing soothing circles on Sara's hip with his thumb and resting his cheek on her head. After a while she caught his hand and held it in both of hers, and he sent a trickle of static through his fingers. He felt her smile against his skin as she responded, and not for the first time, he wondered how a power that was so fearsome in battle, that he had seen launch opponents a hundred feet into the air and rend their bodies in two, could feel like a cool spring breeze against his skin.

A force of nature his Sara may be, but she was as vulnerable and human as anyone under the measured professionalism she presented to the world. He had half a mind to march straight up to Tann's office and tell him exactly what he thought of the Initiative's treatment of the woman who had given them so much, at so much personal cost, but he knew Sara would be mortified. He'd have to settle for sharing his anger with Sahuna later, when Sara was out of earshot. She'd understand; when his own father had died, it had taken many months until he even smiled again, and he'd been surrounded by a warm and supportive family. With her brother in a coma, Sara hadn't even had a single friend to turn to. Even now, the thought of her suffering all alone made him want to hold her closer, so she'd never have to feel alone like that again.

“Jaal?” said Sara, her voice still a little hoarse from crying. “You all right?”

“Hm? Of course, dearest,” he said, adjusting his hold on her and pressing a kiss into her hair. Hopefully she wouldn't notice his own sadness; one thing he had taken away from his interactions with humans was that it was sometimes better to hide your own feelings for the sake of the person you were trying to comfort. It wasn't necessarily something he understood, or liked; but he did it anyway, for her.

“I was just thinking. About Scott.” She sighed. “Tann didn't mention him, but even if he doesn't have to go, he will, because I'm there and he'd want us to be together on that day. I should go and talk to him. I don't know if he'll know about the ceremony yet.”

“Being around your family will probably help,” Jaal admitted. He lifted Sara from his lap and set her back down against the pillows. “But at least let me make you breakfast first.”

At last, Sara smiled. It was small and shaky and her face was still wet and blotchy, but it was a smile. She reached up and ran her fingers from the top of his head and over the edge of his hood, her fingers lingering over his heart. “Thanks, Jaal. I'd like that.”

He leaned down and kissed her, before making his way to the galley, trying to work out how the stars he was going to help Sara through the next few weeks when her superiors seemed determined to treat her like Initiative property.


	2. Chapter 2

Sara wandered for what felt like an hour. She'd told Jaal she was going to find Scott, but he was nowhere to be found. She didn't even know if he was still on the Nexus, or if he'd found a reason, any reason, to get off the space station and visit one of the outposts for an errand.

Eventually she found herself in the cryo bay. Sara was glad to be out of the busy halls and corridors, where she had to return every _Pathfinder!_ and _hey, Ryder!_ with a smile and polite nod, even though she was sure she'd never seen most of the people who spoke to her. Still, she'd tried to avoid this place as much as she could. The air carried a chill that made the hairs on her arms stand rigid. No matter how much she told herself it was dumb to expect a cryo bay not to be cold, it just felt like a morgue.

It was peaceful in here, though. As she wandered up through the main passage, she glanced at the displays above the cyro pods she passed. By now most of them were deactivated, their inhabitants happily carrying on with their lives somewhere in the cluster she had helped make safe. Or they were already dead. Both were possible. Either way, it meant that the medical staff who scurried about with datapads and medical scanners stuck to the opposite end of the bay, where people were actually being woken up. The part Ryder headed for was mostly abandoned and forgotten. Mostly.

“Hey, mom,” she said, pressing her forehead to the cold metal of the pod above which the words ELIZABETH REILLY shone in neon blue print. She sighed, her breath misting up the gleaming surface. She sat down, leaning against the pod opposite, knees drawn up to her chest and arms resting on them. “Scott said he'd come visit you,” she said after a while. “I don't know if he did, but he said he would.”

Her words hung in the still, cold air. There was no response.

“Sahuna tried to make cookies the other day,” she said, letting her eyes drift closed. “I think Jaal told her they were my favourite. They looked a bit floppy but I'm sure she'll get the hang of it, she's a good cook. I'm going to ask Jaal to teach me how to make some angaran food so I can surprise her.”

Silence.

“The Initiative need to hurry up and find a cure so you can wake up. I can't wait for you to meet Jaal.” Her lips curled up in a faint smile. “He'll probably seem a bit weird at first, because he's like, an alien and stuff. Not like a turian or an asari, but _really_ alien. He likes to hug, too. He loves me so much, mom. I know you'll love him too, just for that.” She fell silent as an asari in white medic robes entered the bay, but seeing Ryder, she took her readings quickly and hurried out. Maybe she looked crazy, sat alone talking to a cryo pod, but Ryder didn't much care. “And Scott's being...well, Scott. I think he's bitter he missed out on the fighting, because he spends most of his time at the outposts. I don't even know what he's up to most of the time. Well.” She rolled her eyes. “I know what he's doing on Kadara, at least.” She leaned in, lowering her voice in case anyone overheard her gossiping. “There's two guys, mom. _Two_. He can't decide which one he likes, but they're both _so_ into him. The one on Kadara's called Reyes. Just a major crime boss, nothing to worry about. And then there's Tiran Kandros, the security guy on the Nexus. He seems nice, but kind of shy. He's always asking me about Scott, how he's recovering, what he's doing. I wish Scott would just hurry up and decide, it's kind of painful to watch.”

“I heard my name,” a man's voice called from the entrance.

Sara raised her head slowly. Her brother strode towards her, the limp from the last of his lingering injuries having worn off, replaced by his usual swagger. It was still strange, seeing him like this—for most of her time in Andromeda, Scott had been confined to the sick-bay, his cheeks hollow and his eyes dull, and that was just when he was awake. He was like a different person now; he'd quickly gained back the muscle that had wasted away, and now his eyes were bright and his hair carefully combed into a short quiff, where before it had been a limp, straggly mass. “Hey,” she said as he sat down next to her.

“Talking to mom again?”

She sighed. “How'd you know where to find me?”

“We're twins. I know the depths of your soul, your most secret thoughts and feelings...” he said, digging his fingers into her temples.

“Fuck off, Scott--”

“Also I asked SAM.”

She rolled her eyes. “Of course you did.”

He let go of her head and leant against the same cryo pod she had her back to. “Yeah, Jaal messaged me. He was getting worried about you, but he didn't want to... _disturb her grief_ is what he said.”

Sara swallowed hard at the memory of that same morning. SAM had dulled the headache that was left over from all the crying, but he couldn't do much about her dry, itchy eyes. “Yeah, we had a talk about Dad this morning, about the anniversary and stuff. I think Jaal feels a bit out of his depth, like he's not sure how human mourning works.” She stared up at the white block that towered over them. The push of a button would be all it took to open it, and she'd have her mom back. For a month or two, anyway. “Neither am I, really. However it's meant to work, I'm probably doing it wrong.”

“Nah,” said her brother, putting his arm around her. “I don't think there's a right way to do it.”

“What about you? How are you getting on?” She looked up at him, trying to ignore how odd the weight of his arm over her shoulders was. When was the last time they had just sat together like this? She couldn't even remember the last time they'd hugged, and right after Scott woke up didn't count. It seemed like the Ryder family were always scattered throughout the galaxy back home. While nobody would ever call them _close_ , Scott had always had that special bond with their dad that Sara had just never been able to form. And yet she was the one moping.

He shrugged. “I'm keeping busy. I talked to Harry about Dad the other day, he's got some pretty crazy stories from their college days.”

Sara rolled her eyes. “Yeah, he was probably too scared to tell them while Dad was alive to kick his ass for it.” She sighed, unfolding her legs. “I guess I'm not sure if I miss him, or if I'm just sad I didn't spend more time with him.” _Not that he would have wanted me to,_ a bitter voice added in the back of her mind. _He was always yelling at me to keep up._

“Probably both.”

“Yeah,” she replied, shaking her head. “It's so weird dating Jaal. When I first met his family I expected his mom and some siblings and maybe a few cousins or something, but I walked in and his house was like, a whole village on its own. And they're all loud and boisterous and loving and I thought I'd hate it but it kind of scared me how much I didn't. And that reminds me, because I'm not letting you escape without asking: did you make up your mind yet? Kandros or Reyes? Or are you going to carry on being a player and destroying those poor boys' hearts?”

Scott blinked at her. “Bit of a change of subject.”

“Sorry. I'm just getting tired of being sad. But you don't have to answer if you don't want to.”

Scott leaned his head back, a pink flush slowly creeping up from the scruff at his jawline. He muttered something she couldn't hear, his eyes fixed on the ceiling.

“What?”

“I said _Kandros_ , Sara. Did you know he came to visit me every other day while I was recovering?”

She almost flinched, hearing the unspoken end of that sentence— _while you were racing round the galaxy exploring alien ruins, saving everyone, and banging_ _other_ _aliens_. “I didn't.”

“Don't get me wrong, Reyes is hot and all, but he's got too many enemies and I can't be getting involved with all that. Kandros actually asked me on a date yesterday.”

“Well, did you say yes?” Sara demanded, leaning in closer. _This_ was how their relationship had always been—gossip, banter, dancing around their feelings. This was familiar territory.

“I—not yet. But I think I'm going to.”

“You think.”

“Well, he's a turian.”

“So?”

“I don't know how that...” He swallowed, his flush darkening. “You know. Works.”

“Ah.” She reached up and patted his head. “If I can figure things out with my boyfriend from two and a half million lightyears away, you can work out the logistics of hooking up with a turian. Our species are practically neighbours.” Scott opened his mouth to say something, but she held up a finger and he fell quiet. “And that is as far into this subject as we go at our mother's bedside.”

Scott's expression was pained. “Don't make me ask SAM about this.”

“I'm not making you do anything.” Sara smiled, rising. The cold floor had made her butt go numb, but she felt like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders compared to when she first sat down. “I'll give you and mom some alone time. I'm starving, and the _Tempest_ leaves for Voeld tonight.”

“Take me with you,” Scott whined, reaching out for her as she backed away while making no move to get up.

“No way, you've got a turian to seduce. See ya.”

It wasn't the memorial service an N7 deserved, she reflected as she headed back to the cafeteria that had just opened for Nexus staff. Back in the Milky Way, Alec Ryder would've had a ceremony with everyone in dress uniform, the extended Ryder family that Sara and Scott hadn't seen since they were little, possibly a couple of journalists. But what he'd got instead was Ryder family time, which was rare enough even when they were all alive.

It would have to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Sara had hated the kett when they were brainwashed zealots determined to take and twist everyone she loved into monsters like them. Now, though, they were brainwashed zealots with no leader and nothing to lose, and she hated them even more.

It seemed that half the kett that remained on Voeld had congregated in the middle of a vast ice sheet a few kilometres from the Resistance base. Maybe they planned to swarm it, or maybe they were huddling together for survival and thought Resistance supply shuttles would be easy pickings.

Either way, they were all dead now, though the fight had been ugly. One of the Chosen had charged headlong into a small group of Resistance fighters taking cover behind their shuttle, seemingly not noticing the bullets ripping through his body. There had been some sort of explosive hidden under his bony armour, and his death had killed three. Sara and the Resistance had kept their distance after that, but by then there were only a few survivors, and they quickly fell to a Resistance sniper's rifle. Some had tried to flee into the dusk, but were picked off quickly. Undoubtedly there were more pockets of kett stragglers out there, waiting for new orders.

She turned the shower off before she could start dwelling on that. With the Archon dead, the kett forces that remained in Heleus were in disarray. The Resistance would mop the floor with them, no matter how desperate the kett got.

“Shower's all yours, Peebee,” she said into her comm as she wrapped a towel around herself.

“Fucking finally,” she replied, and Sara heard the asari, who was last on the shower rota that day, charging along the gangway above her.

Sara slipped into her room, but not fast enough to escape Peebee's inevitable wolf-whistle at the sight of her in her towel. She rolled her eyes. How anyone could have that much energy after a long firefight was beyond her.

Jaal was waiting for her on her couch, as usual. She felt a familiar tug at her biotics as soon as she entered, and she responded in kind. It had taken a while for her to master the subtleties of the angara's non-vocal language (and it _was_ a language, she had discovered, not just raw emotion as she had originally thought), but she thought she was getting the hang of it. It was nice to use her powers for something more constructive than punting kett a hundred feet into the air.

“ _Taoshay_ ,” said Jaal in greeting, opening his arms to her. She wasted no time in crossing over and sinking into them, burying her face in his neck as he pressed his nose into her hair.

“Jaal... _sweetheart_ ,” she said, muffling a laugh against his skin. She _never_ used pet names, not even for Scott, because _asshole_ didn't count as a pet name. But when Jaal spoke to her, his numerous terms of endearment rolled off his tongue as easily as her real name, so the least she could do was try.

He ran his finger around the top of the towel, trying to find where she'd tucked it in. “I don't know why you bother with this,” he muttered.

She leaned up and kissed him, guiding his hand to the right spot. “We humans have a thing called _public indecency,_ though it seems that's one thing our species don't have in common.” She'd lost count of the times she'd been wandering through a Resistance base or outpost looking for someone who'd asked for help, only to run into random naked angara just kind of hanging around. It seemed especially popular on Elaaden, which she supposed was kind of understandable. She didn't want to think about all that sand, though.

Jaal pulled the towel away, tossing it over the arm of the couch. “But there is no need for such modesty here,” he said.

“So now you're the only one wearing clothes. Now who's being modest?” Sara retorted.

“And I will be fixing that shortly,” Jaal promised.

Sara sighed as he ran his hands up and down her back, circling her stiff shoulder-blades, his fingers tracing the bumps of her spine.

“Your muscles are stiff.”

“It's the cold,” she said, bracing her hands on his shoulders as she straddled his waist. “Gets in my bones.”

“Then let me warm you,” said Jaal and, without warning, he swept her up in his arms and crossed the room, laying her gently on the bed. “Turn over, Sara.”

Her cheeks flooded with warmth, but she did as he asked, watching him over her shoulder as he removed his loose undershirt. “I think I like where this is going.”

Jaal laughed, and the sound sent another rush of heat in exactly the opposite direction. God, she'd heard others talking about the things a man with a nice voice could do to them, but it was another thing entirely to actually _feel_ it.

“It is not going where you think. Not yet, anyway.” The bed dipped under his weight as he knelt beside her. A moment later she felt a warm liquid trickle over her back.

“What's that?” she said, craning her neck to look.

“Angaran massage oil,” said Jaal, a note of pride in his voice. “I've been working on it a while; I had to change some of the ingredients, because they did not agree with human skin.” He pressed the heel of his hand into the middle of her trapezius, and she let out a completely involuntary groan. “If it works as it is meant to—“ Ryder felt a tingly warmth blossoming out from where he had trickled the oil over her tired, aching muscles--” it will act as both a muscle relaxant, and a conductor.”

“Conductor?” she said, though it was getting hard to think, her eyes already starting to feel heavy.

In response, Jaal sent a pulse of electricity through her, but it felt different than usual—more intense, deeper, but without pain, shuddering all the way through her until her toes curled. “Oh _god_ ,” she moaned, not caring how she sounded. She felt the knots in her shoulders loosening with every pass of Jaal's skilled hands. “Jaal, I can think of some other ways we can use this stuff. Please tell me you made more.”

He chuckled and leant down so that his lips hovered above the shell of her ear, his warm breath making her sigh. “ _Taoshay_ , I will scour every system in this cluster to find the ingredients to make a whole vat of it, if it means a simple touch can draw those noises from your lips.” He rolled his hips and she felt his hardness pressing against her ass through the soft under-armour pants he wore. One of his hands left her back to cover one of hers, her slim fingers finding the perfect position to curl around his fused ones without a thought from her, they had done it so many times.

She tilted her head to the side and kissed the back of his hand, it being the only part of him she could reach. “You know exactly how else you can get those noises out of me,” she said, raising her hips a little so her ass pressed against his cock, and the little grunt of surprise he made was worth the slight twinge in her aching back.

“Pathfinder, you have new email,” SAM piped up from his spot on her desk. The glow of his hologram suddenly brightened so the cabin was awash in unnatural blue light that outshone the dim light from the moonlit snow outside.

“Fuck, SAM, not now,” she scolded as Jaal kicked off his pants. “Aren't you meant to be in privacy mode?” Jaal returned to his spot above her, this time holding both of her hands.

“Yes. However this email is from Meridian, and it is marked urgent.”

They both froze. After a pause, Jaal sighed. “You should at least open it, sweetest one,” he murmured, kissing her neck before moving so she could get up.

Sara sighed, sitting up on her heels. “I will be right back,” she said, running her hand down his crest, which earned her an appreciative purr.

“Trust me, I will not be going anywhere.”

She felt his eyes boring into her as she crossed the room, and she made sure to sway her hips just a little as she moved. She grinned to herself as Jaal groaned, which he quickly disguised with a cough, though she heard him mutter _temptress_ under his breath. It wasn't as easy for him to hide the spike in his bioelectrics when she made sure to tilt her hips _just_ right as she leant down to see the screen, though, and she grinned to herself.

It was a grin that vanished as she scanned the text, and suddenly she had never felt less turned on.

 

* * *

 

**- MESSAGE MARKED URGENT BY SENDER  \- **

 

**To: Pathfinder Ryder**

**From: Ifri de Tavaar**

**Subject: Developments on Meridian**

**18:17**

Pathfinder Ryder,

My apologies for contacting you like this. I had hoped we would be able to meet in person soon. I am Ifri de Tavaar, appointed by Ambassador Sjefa to oversee the development of a second colony town on Meridian.

There has been an incident here. I cannot elaborate over a channel with such low encryption. I do not want to cause a panic.

We require the assistance of a Pathfinder immediately. Please hurry.

Isharay,

-Ifri de Tavaar

 

* * *

 

 

“Sara, darling?” said Jaal, apparently having noticed the tension seeping back into her muscles like frost. “Is everything all right?”

“No,” she said. “Jaal, we have to go to Meridian. Like, _right now_. Something's wrong with the colony.”

No sooner had the worried frown creased her brow than Jaal was on his feet, reaching her in a couple of long strides and sweeping her up in his embrace. She took a deep breath, pressing her forehead into his shoulder.

“Guess that massage is gonna have to wait,” she said softly.

Jaal rubbed a soothing, slow circle on her lower back. “We will have all the time in the galaxy, later. Whatever has gone wrong, I am certain it will be nothing you cannot handle.”

“It had better be,” she mumbled. “If something's gone _badly_ wrong—” she shook her head, not wanting to even entertain that thought. “Everything we went through can't have been for nothing.” She turned her gaze to SAM's spot on her desk. “SAM, where is everyone?”

“Liam and Gil are building snowmen with some of the outpost children,” said SAM from his spot on her desk, and Sara smiled at that. Fun was probably hard to come by on Voeld. “Dr. T'Perro has met up for coffee with a colleague stationed at Taerve Uni, and Vetra is trading for supplies with the settlement's provisioner. Everyone else is on the ship.”

She closed her eyes and nodded. “Tell everyone I need them back on the ship, and tell Kallo to set a course for Meridian. I want us on our way within the hour.”

“Certainly, Pathfinder,” said SAM, his hologram dimming slightly.

“Looks like duty calls,” said Sara, smiling weakly.

“And always at the most inopportune times,” said Jaal, leaning down to kiss her again.

Sara kissed him back briefly, before breaking away so she could start getting ready. If she let his hands roam any lower, or his kiss grow any deeper, she'd have no hope of getting her head straight before…whatever it was they were going to face on Meridian.

And Jaal had the nerve to call _her_ a temptress.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think that although Primus becomes the new leader of the kett, it might take her a while to wrangle the leftover kett forces that are a bit more isolated, and she'll have to deal with assuming control and getting everyone to accept her as the new leader, so the kett are going to be a bit confused for a few weeks/months after Archon goes. 
> 
> Also, based entirely on That Scene, I headcanon that angara are just kind of serial nudists? Like if you live in pretty close quarters with others you're not gonna get much privacy, and if your thingy is internal then it wouldn't really matter. Jaal definitely didn't think twice about wandering around the Tempest in all his glory. 
> 
> And a little heads up--updates to this fic and Thaw are going to be slow(er than they already are) until June. Deadlines and exams, yay!


	4. Chapter 4

_I do not want to cause a panic._

The words swirled around Sara's head as she guided the Nomad over the dirt tracks weaving through the forests of Meridian. Conservation laws were some of the first to be passed on the new planet, so the only road to the nameless second city was the one that had been forged by building equipment too heavy to take by shuttle. Still, she barely noticed how the terrain rattled her teeth in her skull, as she was too busy trying to work out what the _hell_ Ifri de Tavaar had meant by that.

“How much further, SAM?” she asked. They'd left the _Tempest_ and Hyperion City about four hours ago. Much longer and Jaal would start snoring, and she wanted him to be alert for whatever they would find in the new settlement. She could already see his head drooping to the side when she glanced his way.

“Approximately ten minutes,” came SAM's measured voice. It jolted Jaal from his slumber and he sat bolt upright, clearing his throat in a vain attempt to pretend he hadn't been napping on the job. Sara exchanged a wry glance in the mirror with Cora, who had the back seats to herself. “The settlement is on the other side of this mountain, accessible through a natural tunnel through the mountainside.”

“To think that all this has been here throughout our war with the kett,” Jaal sighed as the Nomad plunged into the dark tunnel. “The perfect sanctuary, right in front of us the whole time.”

“But also right in front of the Archon,” said Cora. “Imagine being so close to getting everything you've spent the last _eight decades_ obsessing over, and then you get killed by the people you were dumb enough to leave unattended when you had them in the perfect trap.”

Jaal let out a bark of a laugh. “Very true! I wish there had not been so many explosions, so I could have seen the look on his face.”

“I think we're nearly here,” said Sara. She always felt the need to change the subject whenever their final stand against the Archon came up in conversation; the reminder of how close they had been to having Meridian snatched from them made her tense her jaw and clench her fists.

A bright white light appeared at the end of the tunnel and brightened with each second, until the Nomad shot out into daylight. Sara brought the vehicle to a stop.

“Whoa,” Cora breathed, shifting over to the window to get a better look. Sara had to agree.

They were parked at the top of a steep hill leading down into a valley that was sheltered by the mountains rising the south side, and surrounded by grassy meadows to the north and west, which in turn was bordered by straggly forest. In the distance, Sara could make out the angular tops of Remnant structures poking out of the canopy. To the northeast of them lay a vast lake that glimmered in the sunlight, the surface broken only by a small forested island in the middle. Along its shores were the beginnings of Meridian's second city.

As the Nomad drew closer, Sara saw that the 'city' was currently not much more than a collection of prefabricated buildings, just like any other Initiative settlement, though this one was different in that the angara had left their mark already. She drove past a few buildings with the green and blue sun-shades that were so characteristic of Aya, and the shuttles lined up in the tiny space port at the edge of town bore the marks of both Initiative and Resistance.

“Pathfinder, you are being hailed,” said SAM.

“This is Pathfinder Ryder,” she said as Jaal tuned in the radio so she could focus on not running over any of the colonists wandering around.

“Pathfinder, thank goodness,” said a voice with what Sara had come to recognise as a Voeld accent. “This is Ifri de Tavaar. Come meet me in the colonial centre—the one with the flags.”

“Got it,” said Sara as she spotted the town hall to her right and swung the Nomad around to come to a stop before it.

The colonial centre was a misshapen lump of a building, with two main storeys and three taller towers at apparently random intervals—control towers or command centres, she guessed. Two flags fluttered in the breeze on either side of the main entrance; the navy blue flag of the Initiative with the insignia of the Meridian colony in white, and a dark green banner with angaran script embroidered in gold, similar to the flags she had noticed around the Resistance HQ.

“Pathfinder!” she heard a woman's voice cry as she and the others hopped down from the Nomad, and Sara looked up to see an angaran woman hurrying towards them.

Her clothes were rumpled and coated with dust, like most other things in the colony, and she clutched a data pad to her chest. It was hard to tell with angara, but Sara sensed she was quite young from the eager, worried expression on her lilac face as she reached them.

“Ifri de Tavaar?” said Sara, holding her arm out for the customary angaran greeting, which by now was almost second nature.

If the woman was surprised Sara knew their handshake, she hid it well. “Yes,” she said breathlessly, crossing her forearm with Sara's. “ _Paavoa._ Welcome.”

“So what's the emergency?” said Cora, surveying the construction around them. “Have the Remnant been giving you trouble?”

Ifri sighed. “I wish our problems were that simple. Come with me.”

She led them back towards the middle of the settlement to a long, nondescript single-storey building. “We get a lot of angaran and human scientists coming here for a couple of days,” Ifri explained as they walked. “They want to observe the wildlife, geology, that sort of thing. So far, we've got the colonial centre, an inn, the medical centre, some temporary accommodation, and now a morgue,” she said with a humourless laugh.

“This is Eos all over again,” Cora muttered, just loud enough for Sara to hear.

“And since you called me here, I'm going to guess it wasn't an accident,” said Sara as Ifri let them into the medical facility.

“That's what I was hoping you could help us with.”

The morgue was a tiny room at the back of the building, and they were greeted by a rush of cold air as Ifri opened the door. “We wanted to send her back to her people, but we can't even spare the resources to move the poor girl.”

That was when Sara noticed the gurney in the corner next to what looked like a cryo pod, with a body draped with a white sheet on it. “Is that--”

“Yes. All we've been able to do so far is keep her in cold storage.” Ifri sighed. “We can't even ID her.”

Sara exchanged a glance with Jaal, who squeezed her hand. Only then did she realise it had started to tremble slightly. “Well, we're not detectives, but we'll do what we can. SAM,” she said, bringing up her omni-tool, “can you find out who this is?”

“Affirmative.”

“Then let's give it a shot,” she said, swallowing hard.

Ifri gently lifted the sheet away from the woman's face. There was a huge bruise under her left eye, and a gaping slash in the greyed skin at her temple. A few flakes of dried blood still clung to her short brown hair. “Is that what killed her?” Jaal asked softly from behind her.

“Possibly,” Ifri said as Sara's scanner cast orange pinpricks of light over the woman's body. “But she also has three stab wounds in her chest, and internal injuries. There were also burns that our doctor thought could have come from an electric charge.”

Sara exchanged a glance with Jaal. “That sounds like it could be Remnant.”

“That seems to be a viable theory, Pathfinder,” said SAM. “It is possible she disturbed a Remnant site while exploring.”

“But why the stab wounds?” said Cora.

“A Breacher could do this type of damage if she was not wearing sufficient protective clothing. Pathfinder, records show that her name was Dr. Madison Burke, a botanist who was revived from cryo four weeks ago.”

“Damn,” Sara muttered. “SAM, notify the Nexus. Did you guys look at the murder site?” she asked Ifri, who nodded.

“She was found not far from a monolith, the one you probably saw while you were coming down the hill. We collected all the evidence that was there and did a thorough scan of the area, but that was a week ago. Anything that we missed is long gone. You're welcome to look, though.”

Sara nodded. “There could still be something there SAM could pick up.”

Ifri drew the sheet back over Dr. Burke's face. “There's a spare meeting room back at the colonial centre you can use,” she said, turning back to the door, and Sara was glad to follow her out of the chilly morgue.

As they headed back up the dirt path, Sara could feel the anxiety settling over the group like a shroud of fog.

It seemed their safe haven in Andromeda wasn't much of a haven after all.

 

* * *

 

There was no sunset on Meridian, only what looked like a distant, gigantic half-sphere that blocked the light from the central...star? Sara was certain nobody had found the time to study their sun yet, but she thought she was looking at the start of a Meridian sunset.

As she sat on the hood of the Nomad, darkness settling in around her, she tried another bite of the sandwich Drack had stuffed in her backpack before she'd left the _Tempest_ that morning, going over the events of the day in her head. There hadn't been a lot of evidence for Ifri's people to collect, and when she and Cora had trekked out to the scene of Dr. Burke's death, the only thing SAM had been able to tell her was that it looked like Burke had first been attacked fifty metres away from the base of the monolith where she was found. All that meant was that she probably put up some kind of fight.

The main thing that was worrying her was _why_. Ever since their victory over the Archon and Sara's final override of the Meridian engine, the Remnant had been peaceful, going about their business as if Meridian still stood empty and abandoned. As long as they were left alone, they posed no threat.

So why would they attack a botanist? By SAM's account, Burke hadn't been close enough to trigger the Remnant defences and anyway, in Sara's experience they didn't bother following if you ran. She thought it unlikely that scientist not trained in combat would want to hang around once the bots got territorial.

None of it made sense.

She jumped when she felt a warm hand on her leg; either Jaal was stealthier than she'd known, or she'd been too lost in her thoughts to hear him approach.

“Jaal! Fuck, you scared me.”

“Sorry,” he said, vaulting up onto the hood of the Nomad to sit beside her. “I have barely had time to talk to you today. I missed you.”

“Yeah, I missed you too,” she said, leaning her head on his shoulder. “Did you find anything useful when you were going over the evidence?” She'd hated to leave Jaal alone to comb through some of the vids Ifri had left of the crime scene, but they were never going to cover all the ground they needed to if they didn't split up.

Jaal sighed, and she felt his bioelectrics become tense. She knew that feeling; anxiety. “There was one possibility that occurred to me, but it is not one I like.”

“Tell me, 'cause I've got nothing.”

“There were some pictures of Dr. Burke's injuries shortly after she was found, but there was something odd about them that I didn't notice until I looked closer. Her stab wounds looked strange, but I had seen them before.” He unsheathed his _firaan_ from his belt and held it up so the evening light glimmered on its straight blade. “You can't see it, but I am currently charging my _firaan_ with a slight static current, though if I tried harder I could force the charge to become much more powerful, which would also make the blade very hot.”

“Hot enough to burn skin?”

Jaal nodded. “I've seen it before, on the rare occasions when the Resistance has had run-ins with the traitors on Kadara. Dr. Burke had some small electric burns around her stab wounds, which Ifri mentioned—but I don't think anyone realised they are exactly the same size as a _firaan_ blade.”

“So you're saying an angara killed Dr. Burke.”

“Not just any angara, Sara,” Jaal said, his voice darkening. “Roekaar. What reason would an angara have to hurt a human who has only been awake for a few weeks, unless they were a Roekaar sympathiser?”

“Shit,” said Sara, raising her face to the sky and groaning. “I thought we were done with them.”

“So did I,” said Jaal, “but it seems they are recovering from Akksul's humiliation. If the Roekaar want to recruit more fanatics, Meridian would be a viable target. It is a symbol of angaran and Milky Way unity.”

Despite the gravity of the situation, Sara had to smile at that, but mostly at how even after all this time, Jaal still hesitated before he said _Milky Way_ , his voice slipping on the foreign vowels. “But how are we going to prove something like that? SAM couldn't find any evidence at the scene.”

Jaal held her closer, pressing a kiss to her hair. “We will think of something. I will see what the members of the Resistance at the port know. They may have seen something.”

Ryder sighed, breathing in Jaal's warm, spicy scent mixed with the floral evening air. “We have to find _something_. We fought too damn hard to lose this place to Roekaar.”

“And we will continue fighting, until Meridian is a safe place for all of Heleus's people. But for now, we should sleep. That was what I came out here for—I didn't like the thought of you out here worrying, all alone.”

He slid down from the Nomad and offered his hand to help her down, steadying her with a hand on her hip as she landed. “Careful,” Sara warned him, “it's not like we're going to get any privacy out here.”

“You are worth the wait,” he said, and though the night hid her smile as he took her hand and led her back to their makeshift bunks in the colonial centre, she was certain he could feel it.

 

* * *

 

Sara woke with a shudder.

She sat up, the pop-up bed Ifri had provided dipping under her weight, and pulled the blanket around her shoulders. It felt like every hair on her body stood on end, but the window was closed and there was no draught that she could feel.

Next to her, Jaal was sleeping soundly, still almost protectively curled around the spot where she had been. She could hear Cora's breathing from the other side of the room, deep and even.

“SAM?” she whispered as she slowly stood up and crept over to the window, hugging herself for warmth. “Did you just hear something?” She craned her neck to look outside. The whole settlement was still, awash in dim silver light from Meridian's moon (or, more likely, dimmed sunlight), and the only movement was the slight stirring of the flags in the breeze.

“There was a minor surge in Remnant activity thirty seconds ago,” SAM replied on their private channel. “But it has now subsided. While we don't yet know enough about the Remnant to determine what caused it, it was most likely a response to a natural phenomenon such as a solar flare. My detection of the event woke you. I apologise, that was not my intention.”

“'S okay,” Sara mumbled. She felt sleep tugging at her once again, and she eased herself back into bed, snuggling up against Jaal. “Night, SAM.”

“Goodnight, Pathfinder. Pleasant dreams.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol how does night and day even work on meridian


	5. Chapter 5

“So. We have a suspected murder in the flagship outpost of our newest colony, where in a few days there's going to be a massive gathering of important people, and now we've got reason to think this was a politically-motivated attack by a shit-stirring Roekaar operative,” Sara said, standing with her hands on her hips at the table in the _Tempest_ 's meeting room. It was a disaster, a diplomatic crisis waiting to happen, and Ryder hadn't felt this invigorated since delivering the killing blow to the Archon.

Finally, after weeks of drifting, she was useful again. She only wished Scott was there at her side, but if he wanted to hang around on the Nexus doing paperwork and flirting with handsome turians then that was fine with her.

Her only worry was the possibility that Scott was not where he wanted to be. None of the Initiative doctors she'd spoken to seemed like they really understood just what the hell the Archon had done to get at SAM through Scott's mind, and there was always the possibility that he could experience some unforseen side effects. She hadn't noticed anything unusual when she'd last seen him, but he was good at hiding that sort of thing, even from her.

_Focus, Sara_ , she reminded herself before she could slip into that labyrinth of worried thoughts and worst-case scenarios. The meeting she was holding deserved all her attention.

Around the table on the deck overlooking the research and development station were Cora, Liam, and of course, Jaal—everyone with the skills or knowledge she thought might be most relevant. Everyone else had the night off.

“Does _anyone_ have any idea where we might start with this mess?” she said. “Any leads, suspicions, _anything_ , I wanna hear it.”

“I was able to obtain a list of all arrivals and departures from the docks before we left Meridian,” said Jaal. “The angaran dock master owed the Resistance a favour.”

“Anyone suspicious?” said Liam.

“One name caught my attention,” Jaal continued. “Avren Vesh. As soon as I saw the name, I knew it could be significant. He _was_ a communications officer for the Resistance, but now he is only a deserter and a traitor.” Jaal said, his nose wrinkled with disgust. “He was actually a Roekaar sympathiser, and he disappeared when someone caught him gathering information on Initiative activities, possibly for a terrorist attack on the Nexus.”

“Christ,” said Liam. “When was this? I never heard about it. Sounds like the guy was lucky he escaped, though. I'd hate to be on the receiving end of whatever Evfra does to traitors.”

“A couple of months ago, before we took Meridian. If he had delayed his desertion any longer, I think Evfra may have shot him, if his anger when he discovered what had been happening was any indication. He wouldn't have relished it, though, especially after learning the truth about the kett. Still,” Jaal said, a note of pride creeping into his voice, “the Resistance does not take kindly to traitors. If Avren is the murderer, you can expect the Resistance to try to convince us to hand him over.”

“And Avren was on Meridian when Madison Burke was killed?” said Sara. Part of her was itching to hunt this guy down, but she forced herself to stay calm. If being Pathfinder had taught her one thing, it was that things were never this easy.

Jaal glanced down at his datapad. “The visitors' log says he landed twenty hours before Dr. Burke's body was found, and was on Meridian for twenty-eight.”

“Plenty of time to get to the town, kill someone, and move their body to make it look like the Remnant did it,” said Liam. “But you'd have thought us and the angara would trust each other more by now. At least enough to say, 'hey, this bloke wants all your people dead, maybe don't let him near your colonies.'”

“You would,” Jaal agreed, “but the Vesh family is very powerful, and are major donors to the Resistance. We couldn't risk upsetting them by blacklisting him from travel, or by making his betrayal more public than it already was, especially since the actual evidence against him was mostly circumstantial.”

“Still, it seems like this guy is our best lead,” said Sara. “Any ideas where we should look for him?”

“The Vesh family is from Havarl,” said Jaal. “That is where we should start.”

“You hear that, Kallo?” Sara brought the pilot up on the comms. “Set a course for Havarl.”

“On it,” Kallo replied, and Sara felt the _Tempest_ rumble to life under her feet as they left Meridian behind.

* * *

 From Meridian, Havarl was about two days' travel away, even at the speeds the _Tempest_ was capable of. Sara spent all of them equally anxious and excited. While she wasn't exactly keen to confront a suspected murderer who would decide he hated her as soon as he saw she was human, solving this murder would be a major step forward for Meridian, especially for the development of the second colony. She felt like a Pathfinder again.

For now, though, she would have to wait. Kallo was a clever, fast pilot, but he couldn't outwit the void.

Jaal, with his usual unending patience, had been listening to her chatter about her old home on the Citadel, asking all the right questions and letting her lie back against his bare chest, held securely in his arms. When he spoke, she could feel his voice reverberate through her back like a purr, and his fingers brushed through her loose hair, as if even after they had been together for several months, the foreign texture of her hair still fascinated him. 

“Sara,” he said when she stopped a few seconds for breath. “I've been meaning to ask you something.” 

“Yeah?” she said, tilting her head back to look at him. She couldn't quite see him, but she definitely felt when his hand came up and brushed over the ridges of her throat, and she shuddered.

“I have been thinking about this gathering on Meridian. I am not sure what is expected of me.”

“Oh,” she said with a small pang of guilt. He'd always been so careful to help her integrate into Heleus. “The Initiative want to hold, like, a big party to celebrate the one-year—one Earth year, at least—anniversary of our arrival in Andromeda. Lots of music, food, dancing, that sort of thing. There's probably going to be people making speeches as well, and I told Tann I wouldn't make one unless I had a gun to my head, though I kind of regret giving him the idea now. 

“Hm, that is what I had thought. It sounds like an angaran wedding.” 

Sara remembered the sheer size of Jaal's family, how when he'd first led her into their home on Havarl she'd first thought they were interrupting some kind of event, but no, there were just a _lot_ of them. “I bet those are...lively.” 

Jaal chuckled. “That is a very gracious way of putting it.” 

“Oh, and you should probably wear something formal, whatever that is for you guys. I don't think we'll be able to find a suit your size.” She worried at her bottom lip for a moment, for once ignoring how it made Jaal's bioelectricity spike slightly. “Fuck, I hadn't even thought about what I'm going to wear. Where the hell am I going to have time to find a dress?”

Jaal leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “Whatever you wear, you will be beautiful. Though I may be able to ask one of my sisters if she can adjust something angaran to fit you, then we will match.”

She shook her head. “I'll find something. I can't ask your sister to go to that kind of trouble for me.”

“Ah,” Jaal said sheepishly, “she may have already offered when she heard about the event.” 

“Oh.” Sara's heart lurched as she pictured her arriving with him, in angaran clothes, dancing and kissing and generally showing all of Heleus that she was still absolutely besotted with her angaran boyfriend. Keri would definitely be there, and she didn't think she could avoid that camera all night. 

It would be yet another reinforcement of their love in the eyes of Heleus. She'd heard whispers that some, both angaran and Initiative, hoped that she and Jaal were just a passing, meaningless fling. Their first very public kiss after taking Meridian could at least be put down to relief or post-victory ecstasy. This was very different. 

Still. There was no way she was going to let a few bitter assholes get between them. It wasn't like anyone would have the balls to say anything to her face, after everything she'd done for them.

She reached up behind her to pull him down for a kiss, snuggling back into him as she did. “Then tell her I would be honoured,” she mumbled against him.

“Pathfinder,” said SAM, and Sara resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

“Yes, SAM?”

“Kallo wishes for me to inform you that we are just under eight hours away from Havarl.”

“Ugh,” said Sara, shuddering as she stretched. “Back to work.”

“You should get some sleep first,” Jaal reminded her as he helped her up off the couch. “We have been talking for hours.”

“Suppose you're right. Should get some beauty sleep before catching our murderer,” she sighed, shuffling towards her bed, pulling Jaal by the hand behind her.

Her tiredness suddenly caught up with her once she lay down, and she was barely aware of Jaal pulling the sheets around her shoulders and drawing her close and secure with an arm over her hips, before she was out.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAY I'M NOT DEAD NONE OF MY FICS ARE ABANDONED i'm just busy and stressy and my mental health is a bit dodge as it is so i've been taking it easy :') I will finish both this fic and Thaw at some point it's just I'm in my second year of uni, working, and trying to keep on top of original fic as well as fanfic and it's a lot. I have detailed plans and I know how they both end, it's just sitting my butt down and writing. Thanks for being patient with me T_T


	6. Chapter 6

She'd never been to this part of Havarl before. Jaal's lead had pointed them to a mountain range far to the east of the vault she had reset, and north of Jaal's family homestead. Here the rainforest, while still enough to make travel on foot difficult, wasn't as dense as it had been in the places she'd already visited; partially due to the thinner air this far above sea level, but she knew her resetting of the vault had allowed the angara to reclaim their home from the forest. If she didn't know, Jaal would have made sure she did. As they walked the final kilometre from the Tempest to the ancient city that housed the nearest Resistance base, he made sure to point out the outposts and watchtowers that had been swamped with vines and trees when he had last visited.

“Here we are,” Jaal said as they reached the top of the final hill. “Nalshenan.”

Sara paused a moment, taking in the sight before her. Nalshenan was similar to many other angaran settlements she'd visited, with rounded, spacious buildings and outdoor courtyards shaded by green and blue canopies, but at least twice as large as the next largest she could remember, not counting Aya. Several of the buildings reached the treetops, and though many of them were empty husks, still strangled by overgrowth, she could still see signs of life among some of the ruins. There were lights in the windows and some of the buildings had obviously been recovered from the forest. 

“A few months ago, Nalshenan was empty,” Jaal said proudly as he led the way down the path to the town. Sara had to use her biotics for balance as the rough ground turned from mud to gravel, and she could hear Liam doing the same with his jump-jet, the sound blending in with the distant call of some forest creature. “But since you reset the vault, people have been coming back. It started with the old Resistance base, but others followed. Soon it will be a city again.”

“D'you remember what it was like before?” said Liam. They were coming into the town itself, and Sara was a little surprised at how normal everything seemed, out here so far from anything else. She could be in any other Resistance town; they passed a small shuttle repair yard, and an armoury that Sara made a mental note to check out later, and she could hear someone singing in one of the windows they passed under. SAM didn't try to translate, for which she was grateful; songs were always better left alone. 

Jaal shook his head. “No; it was abandoned when I was a child. It used to be a trading post for the small mountain daara, and their nearest town. When Nalshenan died, many of them followed, as they were so far from anything else, and there was nobody to protect them from the kett. But now that the Resistance outpost has returned, and the kett are no longer a danger, I think people will come home.”

“I hope they will,” said Liam as they reached the entrance to the Resistance base which, much like the one on Voeld, was partially dug into the mountainside. “God, imagine getting to grow up here, with the rainforest and the mountains and everything. Must be bliss.”

Jaal smiled wryly. “It will be, once the forest no longer tries to kill any children who stray from their homestead, and the kett are wiped off the face of the planet for good. Our contact is this way,” he said, leading them into the base. 

Nalshenan's base was a little smaller than Voeld's, and many of the banks of computers were still covered with dust sheets. As Jaal led them deeper into the mountainside, they passed officers unloading crates of supplies and machinery. There was a musty, damp smell about the place, and in some areas weeds that nobody had got around to pulling had broken through the panelling on the walls. 

They found Jaal's contact at a computer bank nestled into a corner, leaning over a much younger angara's shoulder as he studied something on a screen. He looked up when they approached, his posture straightening instantly when he recognised Jaal. 

“Lieutenant Ama Darav!” he said. “You're here about Avren Vesh?”

“We are,” Jaal replied. “Tashaam, this is Sara Ryder,” he said, a hand on the small of her back. “The Pathfinder. And this is Liam Kosta, of the Initiative. Tashaam is in charge of monitoring Roekaar activity in this area.”

Tashaam's bright green eyes widened in recognition. “The Pathfinder! Stars, I'm so sorry. You humans all look the same, I didn't know...”

She felt Jaal tense, but Sara waved the comment off. “It's fine. What can you tell us about Vesh?”

“We intercepted some Roekaar communications and recognised his callsign when he landed back on Havarl,” Tashaam said, glancing nervously at Jaal. Maybe he'd felt his irritation through his bioelectrics. As they didn't really spend a lot of time around Resistance soldiers, it was too easy to forget that Jaal was almost universally respected and no stranger to command. 

And once he'd reminded her...it was kind of hot.

“We've pinpointed his location to a remote part of the mountains that can only be accessed by shuttle. Your ship would be too loud anyway,” Tashaam was saying, oblivious to Sara's daydreaming. She forced herself to pay attention. “We think it's probably near his home village, but you'll have to be careful. Those daara in the mountains have always been isolated, and there's still a lot of electrical interference from nearby Remnant ruins. The inhabitants won't take kindly to any aliens that come looking around.”

“We've dealt with Roekaar before,” said Jaal. “I don't think they will be a problem.”

“Oh, of course. The...” he traced a line on his cheek where Jaal's scar was. “Thing. With Akksul. Yes, I'm sure you know what you're doing.”

* * *

 

It took them a couple of hours to reach the place Tashaam had marked on her map. The shuttle ride was quiet, and a tension she knew from before a battle crackled in the air. 

Their route took them over foothills dense with jungle that slowly turned to mountains with their barren peaks lost in the clouds. Avren's daar seemed to be in the deeper part of the forest, and the thought made her stomach knot with anxiety. 

“We are getting close now,” said Jaal eventually, not taking his eyes from the air in front of him. Those flying creatures that looked a lot like giant kaerkyns were bolder in this part of Havarl, and had a habit of harassing shuttles if the pilot couldn't get out of the way fast enough. 

“My scans indicate that there is a clearing five kilometres to the west,” SAM said. “It would bring us within two kilometres of our destination.”

“Then that's where we'll set down,” Sara said, but Jaal was already bringing the shuttle in for a landing. 

Outside looked much like the parts of Havarl Sara was already familiar with, though a few plants showed up on her scanner that she wasn't familiar with. “Adding them to the database,” SAM said, this time for only her to hear. 

Sara nodded. “Are we alone?” 

There was a pause. “I cannot detect any threats nearby, but there is some interference from nearby Remnant ruins. I advise caution.”

“You think?” said Sara, readying her rifle. She checked the map on her omni-tool. “Settlement's this way, guys. We'll be prepared for hostiles, but I want to avoid fighting if we can. We might be able to convince Avren to come quietly.”

“Yes,” said Jaal, his voice heavy with derision. “Might.”

“Let's just keep it chill,” said Liam. “We don't know how this is gonna go.”

Despite her confidence, Sara was on high alert as they moved through the forest, as quietly as they could with all the underbrush they had to force their way through. Every flicker of the sun behind a tree turned into the flash of a sniper's sights, every whistle of the wind through the canopy was a bullet aimed right for their heads.

They'd been walking for almost an hour when she stopped them by a fallen log. “This can't be right,” she said. “Shouldn't we be there by now?”

“The forest has slowed us,” said Jaal, leaning his rifle against the log while he took a drink from his hip flask, before passing it to Sara. “But I agree. Perhaps we have strayed from our course.”

“I guess,” said Sara, squinting at her omni-tool. Was it just her, or had her compass shifted from where she could swear north was? “Were Tashaam's directions exact?”

Jaal and Liam shared an uncertain glance. “The Resistance aren't welcome in this part of Havarl,” Jaal said eventually. “Perhaps they couldn't map it accurately.”

Sara groaned. “Fuck. Well, we can't be far off, right?”

“Perhaps – Sara!” Jaal's voice changed to a roar of fear and before she knew what she was happening she was on the ground, Jaal's weight pinning her against the wet moss. The tree that had been behind her just a second ago now had a smoking hole in it.

“Shit,” she breathed. “SAM?”

“Undetermined number of angaran life forms detected,” SAM replied. “I could not warn you before they fired. My apologies.”

“Drop your weapons or we will kill you all,” a male angaran voice said from somewhere behind her. His accent was heavy, and she could tell her translator was struggling.

Sara let her head drop against the loam. So much for stealth.

“Do you think we have a chance?” Jaal murmured from above her. 

She sighed. “No. SAM can't even tell how many there are – Liam, put the gun down!”

Liam's brow furrowed in indecision. “We can take them, Ryder!”

“No, we can't. I'm not risking it. They know this forest, we don't. Stand down, now.”

Liam sighed and tossed his gun to the floor. As soon as he did, an angaran woman sprang from the forest and clamped his hands behind his back, pressing her pistol to his head. “None of you move,” she said, never taking her eyes off Liam.

She felt Jaal pulled away from her and soon she was dragged to her feet. As soon as she stood up she knew she'd made the right decision. They were surrounded by what looked like a whole patrol of angara, many of them dressed in armour she'd only before seen on Roekaar. 

And every last one had a gun aimed right at them.

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the fic I mentioned in the latest chapter of Thaw. I wanted to write something for Andromeda's first birthday but it turned out longer than I thought so I'm starting to post it now. Title might change, not sure yet though.


End file.
